Diane+Boyd


 * SUMMARY: Diane Boyd, age 19, died on October 24, 1981 after a drug error made during an abortion performed by Robert Crist at Reproductive Health Services in St. Louis, MO. **

Nineteen-year-old Dianne, who had the mental capacity of a 14-month-old child, lived in a state institution for the mentally disabled. She was on an all-female ward. There, she was beaten and raped in July of 1981, and was later discovered to be pregnant.

When she was four months pregnant, a safe, legal abortion was arranged for Diane by her mother, with court approval, at [|National Abortion Federation] member Reproductive Health Services in St. Louis.

Diane's mother signed a consent form. The abortion was performed October 22, 1981. Diane went into a coma and was declared dead after being removed from life support the on the 24th.

Because her father, William Trice, Jr., was a PFC in the U.S. Army, Diane was buried in Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery.

According to suits later filed by Diane's mother, RHS staff and abortionist Robert Crist did not check for possible drug interactions before giving Diane valium and sublimaze. These drugs evidently reacted with Diane's usual medication, thorazine, causing her to stop breathing. Diane's mother said that the clinic lacked heart monitoring equipment or resuscitation equipment.

Diane was not the last woman to die after abortion by Crist. Seventeen-year-old Latatchie Veal bled to death after an abortion by Crist in 1991. Twenty-two-year-old Nichole Williams died of DIC (disseminated intravascular coagulopathy) after an abortion by Crist in 1997.

Fourteen-year-old Sandra Kaiser committed suicide after a 1984 abortion at RHS, performed without her mother's knowledge or consent.

Sources:
 * St. Louis City Circuit Court Case 812-11077
 * "Abortion Death Laid to Drug Effect," Seattle Times, Oct. 18, 1981
 * "Mental Patient Dies After Abortion Shock," New Orleans Times-Picayune, Oct. 26, 1981
 * "Abortion Doctor's Allies, Critics Agree: He's Committed To Work," //St. Louis Post-Dispatch,// May 4, 1997





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